Power switch difficult to turn on or off. Battery doesn't last as long as claimed.

Bottom Line

The VTech Kidizoom Smartwatch is actually a camera watch that also happens to tell time. It's fun, easy to use, and has a durable design.

Apparently, even toy manufacturers are getting into the wearable tech craze. The VTech Kidizoom Smartwatch ($59.99) is a camera watch that has a clock function built in. Unlike the LeapFrog LeapBand, the Kidizoom Smartwatch isn't meant to be an activity tracker for kids. Rather, it's part of the Kidizoom camera collection, targeted at children ages 3 to 9 years old, and designed to take photos and videos on the go. Its durable design and easy-to-use interface will make it a hit with the youngsters. Just make sure you turn it off and charge it after each use; in our tests, the battery didn't last long as VTech claims.

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Design and Features
This toy smartwatch most closely resembles the Filip Wearable Smart Locator and Phone for Kids in appearance. Like the Filip, it's made of a rubbery plastic material that's designed to take the bumps and dumps of childhood, and it's meant to be worn on the wrist. Unlike that device, this doesn't offer any phone or locator functionality. Rather, the Kidizoom is meant mainly for taking photos or videos, and learning to tell time through a variety of clock displays. The smartwatch also has three built-in games, a voice recorder (with five voice-changing effects), an alarm clock, a timer, and a stopwatch function. It comes in four colors: blue, green, white, and blue (the color of our review unit).

The watch face features a 1.4-inch color display that has a 128-by-128 resolution and comes with touch functionality. There's a camera located at the top of the watch face, turned outward. The camera has a 640-by-480 resolution for photos and can take either 320-by-240 or 160-by-120 video at 15 frames per second. You can download the photos and videos to a PC or Mac. To the left of the display is the Home button, while to the right is the Camera button, as well as a mini-USB 2.0 port with a removable plastic panel. A mini-USB-to-USB cable is bundled in, and it lets you both charge the Kidizoom watch via your PC and connect to VTech's Learning Lodge app store to download more games and clock displays. You can also use the cable to transfer files between the watch and the computer. (The watch will appear as a removable drive called VTech 1557.) The Kidizoom is compatible with both Macs and PCs. The watch comes with 128MB of internal memory, which VTech says is enough to store about 800 photos or six 1-minute videos.

Before first use, you'll need to charge the watch's built-in rechargeable battery for at least three hours. When it's fully charged, a message will show on the screen, then turn off. It's important to note that in order to successfully charge the watch, the Power switch located behind the display needs to be in the On position. But it's also equally important that you turn that same Power switch to Off when your child is not using the device. VTech claims that the battery will last for two to three days with typical usage, but only as long as you turn off the watch when your child isn't using it.

Performance
When I first turned on the watch, a screen appeared that required me to set the date and time. That involved simply swiping up or down to change the month, day, year, hour, and minutes to the current point. Tap the Check icon, and then press the Home Button to get going.

My five-year-old tester, Matthew, had no problem figuring out the watch interface. It seemed intuitive, and the touch functionality was very responsive. He found it very easy to take both photos and videos, and, with a little assist from his 10-year-old brother, play them back on the display. Granted, most of the photos were of our living room's brick wall, and the one video he shot was from the backseat of our moving car, and none of them are of a good enough resolution to be considered for National Geographic magazine, but the resolution was more than adequate for his needs. He thought it was hilarious to use the voice-recorder function and play it back for his and his brother's amusement. The three gamesSuper Detective, Rotating Puzzle, and Finger Dancewere fun for him to explore, but he was already asking what other games he could download.

My only two nits with the Kidizoom watch are the battery life and the Power switch. The switch is incredibly tiny, which is understandable, since you don't want your child to accidentally keep the watch on and drain the battery unintentionally, or have the switch rub uncomfortably against your child's wrist. However, turning the switch on and off was a pain, involving some manual dexterity and a sharp fingernail.

The battery life was more of a mystery than an annoyance. I actually charged the watch overnight, and Matthew didn't use the watch for longer than an hour. I also made a point of switching it off when he stopped using it. Despite all that, the battery charge seemed low when I next turned it on, and I was forced to recharge it again. It's too soon to say if this will be an ongoing issue with the watch, though.

Overall, VTech has a possible holiday hit on its hands with the Kidizoom Smartwatch. Its wearable form factor will make it stand out in a toy market lousy with tablets and robots, and its intuitive interface means that kids will want to play with it for a long while. Just be sure to keep this toy watch charged, and have some patience with the very, very small Power switch.

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About the Author

Laarni Almendrala Ragaza is the Managing Editor for the Hardware team. She is in charge of reviewing and testing desktops, laptops, netbooks, monitors, external hard drives, components (such as CPUs and graphics card), and peripheral devices, as well as keeping a motley group of lead analysts happy.
Laarni started her career with PC Magazine in ... See Full Bio

VTech Kidizoom SmartWatch

VTech Kidizoom SmartWatch

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